What Else Is There?
by OptimisticPessimist12
Summary: After months of avoidance and nightmares, Michael decided that it was time he and Franklin talked about Trevor. *Slight spoilers for Ending A* One-shot. Strong language.


**Kind of short, drabble-ish. I found myself wanting to write something about Ending A, and the aftermath. Sorry if it's kind of crappy, I wrote it in a pit of writer's block. :/ I'm as much of a fan of Trevor as the next, but I had always imagined a sort of conversation going on between Michael and Franklin after picking A.**

* * *

**What Else Is There?**

* * *

Amanda De Santa was not prepared for the sudden and _very_ hard kick to the back of her lower leg, one that came in the middle of the night and damn well woke her up from stage four sleep.

"Ah! _Fuck_, Michael! _Jesus..._" she exclaimed, her voice groggy, but her anger was very easy to hear. She rolled over slightly, looking at her husband as he lay on his side, back facing her, though she could see that his eyes were open in the darkness, his breathing harsh. His face glistened slightly with sweat, has hands gripped tightly in the blankets and pillow like some frightened child. He hated that the nightmares did that to him, but he seemed to fall for them every time.

After a few moments, he sat up, reaching towards Amanda, placing a firm hand on her shoulder. "Sorry, Amanda," he said, rising up from the bed and started to make it out into the hall. Amanda watched him go, her irritation shifting into concern, though she just let Michael go off and deal with it himself. She had made an attempt to talk with him about the nightmares, but he always just told her it was nothing, and she knew better than to pester him about it.

At least, not that night.

Michael stumbled his way into the bathroom, flicking on the light as he stood in the bright room. It made him feel more awake, the whiteness, as he leaned back against the wall and let out a breath.

"For fuck's sake..." he muttered to himself, trying to will himself to stop shaking like a damn pussy.

It was always the same dream that got to him, one that would plague him every couple of weeks or so. Always when he would think that he got over it, that it wouldn't bother him anymore, was when it struck again, even more vivid than before.

He could still remember the events of the nightmare, how he was always dropped into his own living room, Jimmy and Tracey at his side. It was the false comfort, the contentment of bonding with his children again over a program that seemed to change every time he would have the nightmare. Michael would then rise from his spot on the sofa, the kitchen his next destination. Always the damn kitchen. He would wonder into the area and start to search for something, he could never find it.

Michael was always interrupted.

Much like the man had entered his life after the events of North Yankton, he would walk into the kitchen from the archway leading to the front of the house. No matter how many times he has the dream, Michael believes it's Amanda and turns to greet her, only to be met with something else completely.

There he would be, Trevor, clothes burnt and torn, skin charred, red, and raw. He looked like one of those zombies out of the movies that he watched with Jimmy sometimes, though Michael was always able to identify him right away. Trevor lunged at him then, much to fast for Michael to react to, his hands wrapped around his throat.

"_Fucking Judas! You fucking traitor!_"

It's at that point, looking into the mangled face of the man he had called his friend, the smell of gasoline and burnt flesh in his nostrils, that whatever is driving Michael's subconscious torture decides that he has had enough and pulls him out of the nightmare.

There is a part of him that knows that his subconscious is trying to tell him something, it has to be. That, or Trevor his fucking with him from beyond, which doesn't sound all that impossible, given that he had been able to hold a grudge. Still, in the moments after the dream is being shoved into the back of his mind and Michael is starting to calm himself down, he reminds himself of the reason he agreed to help Franklin murder Trevor.

_He was a psychotic fucker, _Michael reminded himself, _he would have gotten all of us killed eventually. It was only a matter of fucking time. _

It had worked many times after the deed was done, though it still obviously lingered with him. Michael knew that Franklin wanted to talk with him again, he had always told him that he needed _more time_. Yet, there was never enough time to deal with it, and he knew it. Franklin had tried to contact him every month for three months after Trevor's death, though he stopped once Michael stopped answering his calls.

_I'm tired of this shit, _Michael thought to himself. He knew what he needed to do.

* * *

Franklin didn't attempt to greet him in the usual way when he approached him, he didn't attempt to bump fists or give him just a simple "What's up?". In a way, Michael was grateful for that. Franklin knew why he had asked him to meet with him, the older man leaning against the side of his car, arms crossed as he looked down at his shoes. How the hell was he supposed to approach this? There had been so many things that ran through his head, so many ways he had imagined meeting with Franklin again would go, but he didn't have to ponder that for much longer.

"Fuck, you look like shit," Franklin commented, Michael lifting his head up to look at the young man, who's face was serious.

"Yeah, well, I feel like shit," Michael said, pushing himself off the car, "Fuck, Franklin, I haven't had a full night's sleep in four days. These fucking nightmares..."

Franklin didn't reply to Michael, watching as the man paced in front of his car, before finally pausing as he uncrossed his arms.

"We didn't have to do what we did, Frank," he said after a few more moments of silence.

"Mike, dog, Trevor would'a killed the both of us eventually," Franklin stated, "The FIB-"

"_Fuck_ the FIB," Michael stated, turning to point at him, "I had that shit handled. We could have worked this out, Frank. We could have gotten Lester involved, all of us, you, me, Trevor, we could've dealt with Steve Haines, Devin Weston, all of them. Trevor, he would have went back to his shit hole in Sandy Shores and all of us would have been set. We didn't need to fucking kill him."

"Man, shit, I wasn't thinkin' about that at the time," Franklin explained, "You don' think I feel like shit about that too? It don't change anythin', what we did, it's done."

Michael didn't reply, he just paced slightly as Franklin watched him. Franklin had a point, Trevor was dead, there was nothing else that could be done.

"You remember what you said?" Franklin asked, "'bout drawin' a line, survivin'? That's what we did. That's what we doin', dog. It was a mistake killin' Trevor, I'll admit that, but he would'a gotten us killed eventually."

"So, what? We should just carry on with our lives with the money we took from Trevor and the knowledge that we killed him?"

Franklin's response resonated with Michael for a while after the two had parted.

"What else _is_ there, dog?"


End file.
